Landlord stamp duty comment - Foundation Home Loans

08 July 2020

Below is a comment on the implications for landlords of today’s stamp duty announcement from Jeff Knight, Head of Marketing at specialist lender, Foundation Home Loans:

“For a landlord community that has effectively been starved of good news over the past five years, this is a major move by the Government, cutting the stamp duty bill for many landlords buying £500k and below properties. We should not underestimate the difference this will make to landlords who are likely to seize the opportunity that this temporary holiday provides. The fact that they also have over eight and a half months to complete on a transaction in order to secure a property means they have a certain amount of time to carry out their due diligence and make the right choice.

“If previous stamp duty holiday periods have told us anything, it’s that they tend to mean a large uptick in activity and the fact that landlords and investors also have access to the saving, means this may well act as a big catalyst. Even since lockdown was eased, we’ve seen a big increase in demand for buy-to-let mortgages as landlords seek to add to portfolios, and we might anticipate that many landlords who were considering adding to portfolios will now have an extra incentive to do so.

“This is good news for the private rental sector as demand currently outstrips supply and this is something that needed to be rectified, particularly in a post-COVID-19 lockdown environment.”